The Ultimate Guide To #Adulting
Because #ADULTING.
Do you feel in the dark? I know I did after I graduated college! Here's everything you need to know to start your SUCCESSFUL adult life!
Read Part 1 Here: 12 Steps You Need To Take After You Graduate College – Part 1
Life after college is freakin hard because transitions and change are freakin hard.
After college graduation, you probably thought for a bit that you had your life figured out, and maybe you did. You had a job lined up, you knew where you were living and you had a community built; however, you still went through a transition.
You had to adjust to your new life outside of college. You likely had to come to some realizations that you were now in the real world, with real-life decisions to make.
It leads quite a few people into anxiety or depression. I became so anxious when I didn’t know what to do next. That’s why I want to help you in your transitional season.
In the first part of this series, I described the first step you need to take after you graduate college – understanding your priorities and setting them straight.
In college, your priorities may have been to have fun, study hard, win sports matches, or get involved in extracurricular activities or it was probably a mix of all those things.
Now that you’re out of college, it’s time to decide what you want the rest of your life to look like. What are your priorities? Because those will dictate how you spend the rest of your 20s, 30s, and beyond.
Once you know those priorities, it’s time to set some goals so you can accomplish what you want to accomplish. It’s also time to make a bucket list, so you can truly find yourself and not waste your life away behind a computer screen either. What do you want to do before you’re 30?
Read the first blog post in this series here where I go over these in more detail:
12 Steps You Need To Take After You Graduate College – Part 1
Don’t forget to Pin this for later!
Here are the next three steps to take after you have your priorities, goals, and bucket list set up where you can see them:
4. Join a Community
This. This is so so important. College means people everywhere. There were so many opportunities to be involved in different groups or be on a team of some sort. After college, people tend to go their separate ways, and often finding a new community to be a part of can be extremely challenging for many people.
Even though I was still living with friends from college in an apartment after graduation, I was still lacking community. I was adjusting to finding new connections at a new job and also trying to stay in touch with friends that were now living in other states.
Finding a church community was key for me. I was attending a church regularly through college and was somewhat involved in the young adult group, but after college, I decided to find a deeper community.
When I volunteered my time in the church nursery and joined a life group, I was able to find people that cared for me, looked out for me, and prayed for me weekly. I had accountability and trusted friends with that I could share my struggles, fears, and problems.
The older couples in my life group were able to provide me with wisdom in my transition season and encourage me weekly on how my life was changing.
Intentionality is what it takes to find a community after college. You have to be intentional in joining groups, being a part of new things, and forming deep relationships with new friends – especially if you are introverted like me.
It doesn’t just have to be a church community either. There are so many other options as well, like joining a pick-up soccer league, signing up for classes on a hobby you are interested in, or even meeting new people at social gatherings.
Take the time this week to join one new community that you could be a part of. Not sure what that looks like? Start attending a church and introducing yourself. Search for events on Facebook and go to the next one that sparks your interest. Look for workout programs in your town and join a class.
There are so many opportunities to jump out of your comfort zone and explore new communities, now that you are transitioning out of college. You just have to go out and do it.
See my favorite book on Adulting on Amazon here!
See my favorite book on Adulting on Amazon here!
5. Create a Budget
I hope you have set some financial goals as I recommended in step one of this blog series.
A bigger paycheck, now that you have a degree under your belt, means more money to manage.
Unfortunately, I have seen too many of my friends who never set financial goals, were never intentional about their money, and never created a budget. The result – spending money where they didn’t need to spend it and allowing the debt to rack up.
You can easily find yourself too far gone if you don’t manage your money well from the first new shiny paycheck after college.
Setting up a budget is one of the best things you can do to set up the rest of your life for success.
Whether you use a budgeting app like PocketGuard (sign up here and use code PBQ83 to get an awesome reward!), Dave Ramsey’s Every Dollar, Mint, or an Excel sheet, make sure you have one set up.
Here is a quick guideline for you to set up a budget for success:
First, take the average income total you are getting each month. For example, $2,300
50% of that should go to the essentials, like rent, car insurance, gas, utilities, food, and tithing (as a Christian, giving back to my church is something essential to me). Next to each of these categories list what each one costs each month and it should add up to around $1,150 in this example. Another over that needs to be re-evaluated and your cost of living may be too high.
30% of the total income should go to your lifestyle. This includes the categories, of eating out, coffee, entertainment, shopping, and random purchases like birthday gifts. For this example that would be about $690 for your lifestyle purchases each month.
20% of the total income should be your financial priorities, like setting money aside in a savings account, IRA, investments, and loans. In this example, that would be about $460 each month.
However, I recommend heading over to Dave Ramsey’s website or books and taking a look at his Baby Steps to Financial Freedom as well. It is so important to put more money towards an emergency fund and pay off debt first, before your lifestyle purchases. But this is a great budget guideline to get you started.
A budget allows you to stay within your means and not overspend. Piling up credit card debt, avoiding paying off student loans, and not setting aside money in an emergency fund will leave you in stressful months, and financial turmoil, and hurt your credit.
Staying intentional with your budget and staying within the boundaries you set for your money will most likely mean a lot of sacrifices at first. However, the reward will be so worth it in the end.
Now is the time to set the rest of your life up for success, so you can live your most fulfilling life. Now is the time to budget.
Check out this blog article as well to learn about managing your first real paycheck after college:
How To Manage Your First Real Paycheck After College
6. Understand Healthy Eating
After I graduated college, I was suddenly cooking for myself a lot more. I had my own kitchen that I shared with my roommates and it gave me the freedom to try recipes I had never tried before and learn how to cook different items that I had never cooked before.
My advice: do not take this opportunity for granted.
Now is the time to try new things, and that could mean new foods.
If you’ve ever struggled with your health before and you find yourself in this season of life where you are transitioning out of college, then I want to encourage you to take complete advantage of it.
It is a perfect time to take control of your health because you have more freedom to do so. You are not surrounded by as much junk, in the school cafeteria, parties, going out to eat, you name it.
You have the power to choose what you eat without as much pressure. I’m not saying to quit eating out completely or avoiding all sugar at all costs, but now is the perfect time to make baby steps changes to your eating habits.
For example, don’t buy lunch at work. Instead, make a healthy stir-fry and pack it along. Make a healthy smoothie each morning instead of running through the drive-thru. Don’t order pizza, instead make a homemade one with lots of vegetables.
Baby steps and being intentional with what you put in your body every day are key.
Combining a new, healthier diet with a new fitness community like I recommended in point four, sets your body up for success.
When you have a healthy body and lifestyle, the rest of your life will feel so much more enjoyable. It will promote a healthy-wellbeing overall – mind, body, and spirit.
If you are really eager to get your health back on track consider doing the Whole30 diet, where you cut out all the bad stuff and eat mostly meat, veggies, and fruit for a month.
I also highly recommend essential oils as part of any lifestyle. I actively sell Young Living essential oils because I am so passionate about how they help improve my health every day.
Click here if you are interested in learning more and comment on this post to be added to my next class on essential oils!
It’s not always easy when you are entering a new season of life, but it doesn’t have to be so hard either.
Take these positive steps in the right direction and you are setting up the rest of your life for success. Tell me, which steps have you accomplished so far??
Keep Reading: 12 Steps You Need To Take After You Graduate College – Part 3
The Ultimate Guide To #Adulting
Because #ADULTING.
Do you feel in the dark? I know I did after I graduated college! Here's everything you need to know to start your SUCCESSFUL adult life!
Kelsey at GoodPointGrandma
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These are definitely important things to learn how to do after college, and especially learning how to do them in individualized ways that work. The same community or financial plan won’t work for everyone, but everyone needs one of some sort!
You are right Kait! Everyone’s life will look slightly different but to build a successful life, the structure is needed (: Thanks for the comment!
Creating a budget is so important! It’s definitely easy to overlook important life necessities when you graduate–especially since students are used to following assignments and might need some time to acclimate. 🙂 Thanks for sharing these steps, Kelsey!
You are welcome Sarah!